Monday, September 17, 2007

Netiquette

Last night I received an email in which the subject line read "Your "Commenting on Commenting" post on your blog."

Just what does that mean? Are they commenting privately to me on my blog post by that name, or are they asking me to post their email on my blog.

The email was indeed a comment on my blog post, "Commenting on Commenting." Had the sender wanted to comment wouldn't they have gone to the comments section of that post and written?

Nowhere in the body of the email was there any mention of whether this was meant to be a comment or that it was intended to be a private email. The email wasn't signed. I had to make an assumption as to who had sent the email. Having made a few wrong assumptions in my life I will not rely on that alone.

I answered the email and asked for permission to post, but have received no reply. The non-reply could be based on different time zones, email not being read, etc., rather than an implied "do not make public."

When people send me email, I generally assume that they only intend for me to read it and I respect their privacy. When they post a comment to my blog it is obvious that they intend for it to be public.

I do not know if traditional netiquette frowns on making email communications public, but after much thought, I would if it was meant to be a private communication.

In this instance I can not definitively determine the sender's wishes and have decided not to post the comment/email. There are just too many unknowns, so I will err on the side of caution.